Within the field of wireless telecommunications systems, there exists a system referred to as the personal handy phone system, otherwise known as PHS. Within the personal handy phone system, a user of a portable or personal station (PS) device is able to communicate with a user of another telecommunication device by way of a cell station (CS) device. In order for cell stations and portable station to communicate properly, software code is stored and utilized within both types of devices. From time to time, the need arises to update the stored software code within these devices. For instance, software bugs that exist within the stored software code can be corrected by updating the stored software code. Moreover, new and better software code created to improve the performance of portable stations and cell stations gives rise to updating the stored software code. Furthermore, the need may arise to increase or decrease the functionality of a customer's portable station by updating the stored software code.
There are different practices within the prior art for updating the software code stored within a portable station or a cell station of the personal handy phone system. One prior art updating practice involves an engineer or technician of a service provider physically exchanging the read only memory (ROM) chip located within a portable station or a cell station with a new ROM chip containing updated software code. Another prior art practice for updating software code stored within a portable station or a cell station software code involves a technician coupling a computer to the serial interface port of either device. The technician then commences to download the updated software code from the computer into the non-volatile random access memory (RAM) or the flash RAM of the portable station or cell station. Both of these prior art practices for updating software code within portable stations can either be accomplished by burdening each owner to bring their portable station to a central location or by having a technician visit each owner of a portable station. Conversely, to update software code within cell stations, a technician is burdened to visit each cell station wherever it is located.
The previously mentioned prior art practices for updating the software code stored within a portable station or a cell station have some disadvantages associated with them. One of the problems associated with the prior art practices for updating the software code within a portable station or a cell station is that it is a time consuming and burdensome process. Another problem associated with the prior art practices is that it is costly because a large number of technicians are needed to physically perform the updating of the software code within portable stations and cell stations.
Therefore it would be advantageous to provide a method within the personal handy phone system for remotely updating the software code stored within a portable station or a cell station. The present invention provides this advantage.